User generated content (UGC) is currently one of the fastest growing forms of content on the Internet and has fundamentally altered how people add and share content with one another. In particular, UGC refers to any material created and uploaded to the Internet by the general public rather than paid professionals and experts in the field, whether it is a consumer review, a forum post, a blog, a tweet, a wiki, or a personal web page. The advent of UGC has made the Internet a more interactive medium, allowing users to actively participate in the creation of website content.
Like mainstream media, UGC offers a wide variety of news and editorials. The contribution of news through UGC by the general public or “citizen journalism” as it is commonly known is a growing phenomenon. For example, audiences witnessing incidents can post eyewitness accounts on the Internet as soon as they happen or send reports and photos to the media. There are even specific applications and web sites that have been developed to promote the reporting of social incidents such as accidents, weather, traffic jams, and infrastructure damage such that responsible parties or parties potentially impacted by the incident may take action. However, there is currently no solution to harness the power of the general public knowledge via UGC that can work with substantially any type of report and can be customized for each responsible party or party potentially impacted by the incident.
Additionally, with no ethics and media laws to worry about, unlike professional journalists in the mainstream media, citizen journalists can offer unmediated and anonymous debate and analysis of issues. Thus, a fundamental problem of citizen journalism for the reporting of social incidents, interests, and services is the ability to hide behind anonymity and potentially feed opinion or false information as fact into the media.
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art to overcome the deficiencies and limitations described hereinabove.